05 Jul, 2006
That's right - Mensa Dodgeball. I'm going to the Mensa World Gathering this year in DisneyWorld. In addition to some lectures, some Yoga classes, and some Scrabble tournaments, there's a dodgeball tournament of all things.
I've decided I must attend this for two reasons:
1. To see nerds get hit with dodgeballs.
2. To hit nerds with dodgeballs.
Now I'm not Mr. Super-Athletic (far from it) but how can I pass up a chance like this? Roxy has committed to taking pictures of the fallout so hopefully I'll have some good ones to post.
Ok, as promised, here's an action shot of me playing dodgeball at the 2006 Mensa World Gathering. I apologize for the quality - my camera takes exceptionally bad action shots, which is unfortunately. Although to it's credit, I was a blur of sweet dodgeball moves as exhibited here. My team made it through 2 rounds to the semi-finals which was much farther than I expected. But unlike other teams *cough* WE didn't swap out our weaker players with reinforcements from teams that were eliminated - which I think can hardly be considered ethical. Even so, I was very pleased with the team work he had and with my own individual performance - in fact, I would have been happy with much less. I was quite the dodgeball demon... well, compared to people with things like "All your base are belong to us" on their t-shirts.
05 Aug, 2006
A few months ago, I sent a letter to Mensa Magazine in response to an article and a few letters. My well-crafted response didn't make it into publication (granted it's a little harsh), but "Ha!" to you I say Mensa Magazine, for I, like many others who have not been publishable have a blog. Having a blog, I can post my letter to the Internet - though no one is likely to read it... or understand the context... And you (Mensa Magazine) with your fancy editors and "grammar" and "spell-checking" and "literate readers" are too high-falutin' to post my letter... well "Ha!" I say! "Ha!":
Let me mention briefly a error made by R. Cuplin in his article about atheism. Cuplin refers to the Golden Rule as being a natural part of atheism. He is incorrect in this assertion. Atheists conclude that there are no gods. But atheism puts forth no other assertions of any kind, including the moral compatibility of the Golden Rule.
Also, in the article by Rick Flanigan, he mentions "Xmas" being used instead of "Christmas" to prevent offense to non-Christian shoppers. This may be true in some cases, but the origin of "X" representing "Christ" was originally used by the church as as short-hand, with X representing the Greek letter "Chi".
On a personal note, I resent (nothing personal though, Rick), people comparing the Christian creation myth with the hard work that went into Big Bang theory. And I have no doubt that, were the article written before the Steady-State Theory was proven false, it would be extolling the similarities between Creationism and Steady-State. Randomly pick a theory, randomly pick a myth, and "with a bit of imagination" and some cherry-picking you'll undoubtedly find yourself a match.
Finally, Flanigan mentions that science "cannot separate right from wrong". But then, neither can religion. And, before you (the reader) react with "Yes it can!" remember that your religion/morality system is mutually exclusive from the religion/morality system down the street. A morality based on faith is, effectively, a morality based on nothing.
-Don Atreides
05 Aug, 2006
Despite my previous unpublished letter, I decided to write another. A glutton for rejection perhaps? Well, I'd probably set my hopes too high; my first letter to the editor of the Washington Post was published. Presumably hundreds of letter are sent to Mensa Magazine - my uber-excellent letters must have gotten lost in the shuffle. :)
John Byrne writes that agnosticism is a "cop-out". As an atheist, I can understand the social stigma associated with the title. But perhaps agnostics just haven't decided yet which One True God is right for them. With some form of eternal damnation being the result of making the wrong choice, it's no wonder that so many are "straddling the center line".
-Don Atreides